The Faculty of Accounting and Finance (FAF) has organized a free Seminar for small business owners dubbed, “Growing and Sustaining your Business.” This forms part of the Faculty’s Corporate Social Responsibility to train SME players within the University’s catchment area on the need to build customer relations, keep financial records, market products, access credit facilities and how to use technology to enhance their business.
The objective of the Seminar, which was attended by over 50 participants was to build the capacity of SMEs to improve and build their businesses to become more profitable.
Speaking on the theme of the Seminar, the Dean of the FAF, Dr. Raymond K. Dziwornu, noted that in interacting with SMEs, he realized they needed to have more customer-oriented relationships, thus the need to improve upon customer service to grow and sustain their businesses.
According to the Dean, another challenge SMEs encountered was the lack of requisite skills to manage their finances and keeping records of their operations, making it difficult for financial institutions to evaluate businesses and to offer credit assistance.
Lecturer at the Department of Banking and Finance, Ahmed Jamal Iddrisu, said utilization of resources by SMEs was one of the challenges and urged them to also strengthen their record keeping procedures.
He urged SMEs to complement each other and build healthy relationships between themselves and their customers.
Lending and Credit Management expert, Christine Avortri, underscored the need for participants to know the various types of credit facility they go in for.
She said not all SMEs needed cash but other credit facilities that would help them access, buy goods on credit and sell with the Bank’s support, which they could pay later.
Maud Ashong Elliot, Lecturer in ICT stressed the need for SMEs to start using their smartphones to enhance their business. She said there are so many applications that could be used on their smartphones for activities such as bookkeeping, and the sales and marketing of their goods.
In a Question and Answer session at the end of the Seminar, participants were of the opinion that they had learnt a lot of things that would enhance their businesses and hinted that the faculty should organize more of such seminars to build their capacity.
